Originally published at: https://appletalk.com.au/2019/05/wednesday-morning-news290519/
Apple has released a new iPod touch, with an A10 Fusion chip on board and an even larger 256GB capacity. Thanks to the new A10 chip, the new iPod touch now supports Group FaceTime and AR experiences for the first time, which probably isn’t all that surprising given that this is the first iPod touch update since July 2015. The new iPod touch comes in six colours including the traditional Product(RED), and starts at $299 for 32GB of storage, with the 128GB and 256GB options coming in at $449 and $599, respectively, with online purchases available right now, and in-stores later this week.
A WWDC wish list from Steven Troughton-Smith tells us about the things he still wishes iOS had. Troughton-Smith says that the lines are becoming increasingly blurred between regular consumers and developers, at least when it comes to iOS on the iPad, so his calls for Xcode on iOS, a command-line interface, scripting, as well as more support for peripherals and the extra filesystem support that comes with that, all make sense from a pure user perspective, even if some of those features could lead to better user experiences from developers later on.
9to5Mac has exclusive screenshots of iOS 13, showing us a purported dark mode that has been rumoured to arrive in the next release. But while dark mode may end up to be a relatively minor change in the grand scheme of things, what Apple are doing with their markup icons by re-introducing a sense of realism to the available tools may signal a larger change in the overall design direction of iOS, even if we won’t see as much change as we might have hoped. But there is still hope — until Apple announces it on stage, nothing is official.
Apple has started to collect mapping data in Canada, releasing a statement on its Canadian website and to local newspapers saying that Apple Maps vehicles will be seen on the roads from this week on. It’s unclear if Apple plans to expand this kind of car-collected, improved mapping data to the rest of the world — if they don’t, they’ll be behind Google Maps, and if they do, they have years before they can catch up to Google, who has been doing this kind of thing for years. In any case, it may be months before Canadians see improved mapping data in Apple Maps.
The Washington Post reports that some iOS apps are using the background data refresh feature to send data to tracking companies. Apps from many popular companies sent data to third parties, some of which were personally identifiable like phone number and email, while others included sensitive but more innocuous data like IP address and location. MacRumors points out that this data collection isn’t necessarily bad, but can pose potential privacy concerns if we don’t know what data is being sent, how the data is used, or how long the data will be stored for.
New iPhone rumours include the fact that 3D Touch may be removed from all iPhones this year in favour of its less-capable sibling Haptic Touch, as found on the iPhone XR lineup. It’s unclear why Apple would remove the feature given that it has proven that it can already enable 3D Touch on edge-to-edge OLED displays such as in the iPhone XS and XS Max, so perhaps this is a simplicity move. Meanwhile, a separate rumour says that this year’s iPhone may be able to play audio to two Bluetooth devices simultaneously.
If I asked you about Apple’s least well-known iOS app that is still currently available, what would you say it was? Music Memos is definitely up there, and it seems Apple may have forgotten about its own app until now, seeing as it only released an update to Music Memos to support the larger and edge-to-edge displays of the iPhone X/XR/XS/XS Max today. There’s no other notable changes within the app, which is probably bad news for anyone that still uses Apple’s music recording app.
A little update to 1Password contains big changes to 1Password mini, the version of 1Password that you see when you click on the icon in your menu bar, or when you invoke the keyboard shortcut. With a renewed focus on filling passwords from 1Password mini and a bunch of improvements to other usability, it’s a nice little update to what’s quickly becoming the most-used part of the app.
MacRumors speculates on the name of what this year’s version of macOS will be called. There’s a few different Californian place names that Apple can choose from this time around, but looking at trademarks from potential Apple shell companies point to a few likely candidates: Mammoth, Monterey, Rincon, and Skyline.
Over 323 "I’m a Mac" ads were shot, although only 66 ever saw the light of day. Justin Long says Steve Jobs rejected the ones with too much humour, saying Jobs preferred the ads that weren’t too funny, claiming that they may have detracted from the focus on the product.